Krista Pylant
Sports Editor
@KristaPylant8
The Cameron men’s and women’s tennis teams split a pair of matches against Oklahoma Baptist University on Sept. 9 at the Streich-Henry Tennis Complex.
The men’s team will now begin their season undefeated after beating OBU 7-2, while the women faltered in a 5-4 loss to the Bison.
The teams were originally slated to play in a scrimmage against USAO on Sept. 6, but rain cancelled the matches. Due to the cancellation, the OBU match became the Aggies’ first and only team event of the fall that will also count toward their overall win and loss record that resumes in the spring.
Men’s and women’s tennis coach, James Helvey, said that the matches gave his teams an opportunity to get back on the court and gives him an idea on where they are at in their game.
“It’s the first match and OBU’s got a good team,” Helvey said. “I have a good relationship with the coach and we always play in the fall against them and just kind of used it as a warm-up.
“As far as being special, I want to win this match. I like to win everything I play, but also, I use it to get a good look at what I have and my new players and my returners to see where we’re at.”
The number 21 nationally ranked men’s team began their day by taking the top two doubles slots early.
In the number one slot, the Aggie pair of Dennis Merdan/Felipe Oyarzun defeated OBU’s Deaniel Aguilera/Michael Vetter 8-4 while CU’s second slot Justin Baciu/Joao Fazendeiro made quick work of OBU’s Thomas Ackerknecht/Russ Gegring for an 8-1 victory.
Dean Weigelt/Andres Velasco recorded the only doubles loss for the Aggies after Matthew Tabor/Partick Sims of OBU defeated them 9-8 (3-0).
The Cameron men continued to dominate in the singles portion with wins from Merdan (5-7, 6-2, 6-4), Lencioni (7-6, 6-1), Baciu (6-1, 7-5), Fazendeiro (6-1, 6-2), Knyazyan (6-0, 6-3).
On the women’s side, the #34 ranked Aggie’s fell in their first and third double’s slot after OBU’s Anastasia Barenova/Kateyna Shkot defeated Angie Torres/Paula Gutierrez 8-5 and Alex Morales/Kathryn Sild (OBU) beat CU’s Magdalena Kovinic/Dejana Veljic 9-7.
The only double’s victory for the women came from Eugenia Sanchez/Samantha Wood who defeated Ashlynn Abbe/Olivia Charvat 8-5.
Sophomore Samantha Wood said of her match, “Going into it I was a little bit nervous but I think we managed to deal with the wind and make sure we were tactical and get the serves to the backhand and managed to take over the match.
“Some strengths were their [OBU]returns so we were serving everything to the backhand. It was difficult on one side with the wind blowing in our faces so we had to make sure we got the lob deep.”
In single’s play, the Black and Gold took three of their six matches with Paula Gutierrez (6-3, 5-7, 6-4), Samantha Wood (6-2, 6-3) and Eugenia Sanchez (6-1, 6-2) each recording wins for the Aggies.
Even though team play is done for the Aggies until the spring, the fall still holds individual play opportunities for Cameron beginning Sept. 19-20 at Midwestern State’s Invitational Tournament.